First half goals from Ruby Leon, Jessica Ortiz and Nancy Gandarilla were enough to see the Cerritos women’s soccer team defeat Long Beach City College, 3-0, on Oct. 9.

The win puts Cerritos at 3-1 in conference play, and tied for second place with Long Beach.Both teams are now sitting on nine points, one point behind Mt. San Antonio College. They next play third place LA Harbor on Tuesday, who has given up only a meager three goals on the year.

“This game was important because they were in first place, and we also have a big rivalry with them,” Ortiz pointed out.

The match was allowed to be very physical from the opening whistle, as appeals for fouls from both benches were continually waved off by referee Tuan Pham throughout the contest.

“The refereeing affected the game. There probably should have been a couple of red cards for them,” said head coach Ruben Gonzalez.

There was a lot that the ref said he didn’t see, but our players were getting kicked after just about every play.”

The uncharacteristically physical nature of the game was not enough to disrupt Cerritos’ offense.

Leon put the Falcons on the board first with a goal in the 13^th minute. She calmly collected a through ball from defender Viridiana Ortega and slipped a shot past goalkeeper Iliana Aparicio for her ninth goal of the season.

Ortiz doubled the lead six minutes later by firing home a rebound from just inside the 18 yard line.

Gandarilla, in her first game at Long Beach since playing for Vikings in 2006, finished off the scoring in the 32^nd minute by receiving a pass from Tatiana Cortes and chipping an onrushing Aparicio.

She was also pulled out of the game in the 65^th minute after falling victim to a pair of harsh tackles within a matter of seconds.

Gonzalez explained that he felt the Long Beach players were going after the ex-Viking and trying to bait her into a response. He said that he kept her out for her own safety.

Gandarilla explained that “it’s kind of hard to keep a cool head in such a physical game, but it makes [the other team] even more mad when you don’t react to the stuff they’re doing.”

Although concerned at times for his players’ safety, Gonzalez felt his team played its best game of the year.

“I feel like the first half was the best half we’ve played so far, and this was our first above average performance up to this point,” he said.

As long as we keep not giving up goals, we will continue to be successful.”

The shut out honors were shared by Erika Trejo in the first half, and substitute Laura Ropp in the second. They combined for four saves on the day.